Wrestling's worst heels continued...

Next stop on the tour of shitty gimmicked baddies is The Repo Man.

When I think back to Repo Man, I just think 'what the fuck?'

Basically the gimmick for this guy is he would carry a tow rope and pretend that he has been taking delight in repossessing cars that the owners couldn't pay for but was basically like the legendary riddler in the old 60's Batman, complete with crappy eye mask.

Not long after his eponymous debut, he started a feud with Virgil by causing him to lose the Million Dollar belt back to The Million Dollar Man; a feud with Virgil marks a significant arrival, a bit like saying "Welcome to the undercard, see you in obscurity in a couple of years".

He was also quite the jobber in the end.

His last feud of note was with the Macho Man Randy Savage when horror of horrors, he stole one of Randy's hats. The barrel was being firmly scraped with this one.


O.....k...

As you can see, his microphone wrestling isn't too bad, but it does make me cringe a little looking back.

Before he was the Repo Man, he was one half (or at times one third) of the gimp-tastic former tag team champions, Demolition - he was Smash.

Again, another generic character based heel, but with a mischievous nature - perhaps he could have been used as a face by causing grief to the other heels by nicking their stuff, just imagine him stealing Paul Bearer's urn and getting destroyed by the Undertaker...

Ratings: Microphone skills: 2.5/5, In ring: 2/5, Gimmick shiteness: 3/5.

Coming soon, Kamala.

Wrestling's worst heels...

Welcome to the guide to shite baddies. Over the coming weeks I will be counting down the most retarded, ridiculous and dullest heels in history.

First of all, I should say that I am not against flamboyancy in wrestling, but most times they are there for people to enjoy as those ones that make the proper heels look stupid - Doink the clown for instance.

First on the list is the one and only Irwin R. Schyster, also known as I.R.S. Clever eh, Can you see what they did there?

His gimmick was that he was portrayed as a former IRS tax collector from Washington, D.C. who harassed all of the faces and fans, urging them to pay their taxes.

As an in ring wrestler he wasn't bad, won his fair share of matches and enjoyed a distinguished career as one half of "Money Inc". However, the reason IRS appears on this list is the fact that you would struggle to find a more engineered heel as nobody likes paying their taxes but they must and he's there to represent the enemy of the people - dull.

Some of his promo's were pretty good too like the one below where he bollock's the whole of the US for being tax cheats - not a bad microphone wrestler.



That, however proves my point - IRS is a genetically engineered heel, one that could never endear himself to the fans - a real one trick pony.

Ratings: Microphone skills: 3/5, In ring: 3/5, Gimmick shiteness: -3.5/5.

Coming soon: The Repo Man.

Review: WWE Raw, 10th May

This week's Raw was a lot more entertaining than it has been of late, but the in-ring stuff, on the whole, still falls into the bracket of what I've been calling 'wrestling-lite'.

Raw opened with ol' snake eyes Randy Orton calling Edge out for a mic wrestle... But wait, that's not Edge's music, that's a Meatloaf song. So Meatloaf came out out to plug his new album, which no one under the age of 45 is likely to buy (it has a song written by Bon Jovi on it, hell yeah!). It's weird, when Meatloaf's not singing, the guy can be pretty entertaining. He was in the ring dancing round Orton trying to get Orton to have one of his songs as his theme song. Orton just stood there. Meatloaf then started singing in Orton's face. Orton just stood there. Meatloaf continues to piss Orton off. Orton's so wooden he makes Mokujin from Tekken seem like a viable alternative for spooning at bed time. The wooden man starts to move; it's a bit like that uncanny moment in the Wizard of Oz when Dorothy realises that the scarecrow is alive. Orton then goes for his trademark RKO. With Orton's relationship with guest hosts, RKOing them at every opportunity, you can't help but think that Orton is a poor man's Stone Cold and the RKO is a cheap facsimile of the Stunner.



With Meatloaf out cold, Edge makes his appearence with Vicky Guerrero in tow, standing there like some greedy girl who's eaten the last block of butter. It seems that Edge has convinced WWE management to bring her in as General Manager. It's not great, but it's better than the guest host bullshit. There's a bit of a microphone exchange. Vicky puts Orton in a handicap match, which is quite appropriate as he looks a bit simple.

Next we have a pretty mediocre match between Mini-Bulldog and Jericho for a chance for Jiz to have a title shot at Over the Limit. He wins, the match is pretty uneventful.

Now for the guest host, who enters with R Truth: the one and only Flava Flav (who's on plugging some reality show or something). For those not familiar with Flava Flav, he was basically the talentless one from Public Enemy who would wear the big clock and stupid hats and whose ability on the mic went as far as him saying 'yeah, boiiiieee'. He didn't disappoint. Flava Flav entered looking like he'd just stepped off of the set for the Don't Believe the Hype' video shoot. Stupid hat, big clock and 'yeah, boiiiieee'. Like the Bez of hip-hop, Flava Flav had exhausted all of his gimmicks. With the match between Regal and Truth it was only a matter of time before something heel happened. And boom! Not one, but two Virgils come in the ring end the match in the form of Carlito and Primo. Dibiase comes out onto the ramp and pays them for their Virgilious services.

Next there was Divas promo spot. Now, I think that the Divas thing is a joke. Just a bit of wank fodder for teenage boys. WWE don't make any effort to take women's wrestling seriously, so I don't take the Divas seriously. Sorry ladies. In a promo spot, Maryse is showing that she does have some genuine athletic ability by showing her training with a martial arts coach. Just check out the bitch slap she gives this guy, it must have smarted like crazy.



With a pointless match with Jack Rider out of the way, we move onto Tyson Kid versus the Miz, if the Miz lost he would have to defend his American Championship title against a member of the Hart Family of his choosing. The match was over in a few seconds with Tyson Kid getting a quick pin. Tyson Kid has the most stupid hair in the WW; I imagine that this is how Tin Tin would do his hair if he got a job as a rent boy. So Miz chose to defend his title against Bret Hart, presumably so Bret can leave the WWE with some dignity this time.

Next up was a match with the NXT 'rookies' facing a team of John Morrison, Goldust and a couple of jobbers whose names escape me. The match was pretty poor except for the fact the Brian Danielson got the pin meaning his first WWE victory was on Raw. It's about time he started getting some heat, he should be on Raw already, not on some bullshit let-down of a reality show.

We then cut to one of the most entertaining promos of the night, featuring none other than, Cannock's finest, William Regal. As a mic wrestler, Regal's still got it, it's just a shame that WWE see fit to put him in the role of jobber on Raw, teaming him up with the token Russian heel guy, Boris whatever. In the promo Regal essentially lets Flava Flav know what time it is (geddit? Flava Flav wears a clock, geddit?), by letting him know that he is a talentless fuck who rides on the coatails of the infinitely more talented Chuck D. Okay, maybe he didn't quite go that far, but it's still funny... and topical!



Next we see Mark Henry getting choked out by Batista in a match that didn't happen. I was glad to see Mark Henry being done over in such a way. Yeah, he might be the world's strongest man, but he can't wrestle for shit and he looks like a fat bastard.

Then we have the spaz match with Randolf, Edge and Dibiase. Again, the match is pretty dull and Orton wins. By the end of the match he attacks Vicky G with the RKO after she pleads and offers her resignation. What a bastard.



Thank fuck that screeching bint has been let go.

In summary: another episode of wrestling lite with some pretty funny promos. Still, it's better than Smackdown.

Bring on Sacrifice!

Review: WWE Raw, 3rd May

I'll admit it, I'm niave. I thought for some strange reason that the draft would shake up Raw and make into a great product. Instead, it was predictable and boring.

The night opened with number one contender Batista coming out to talk to the crowd about being number one contender (again), he talked some more, and some more. Sheamus came out and they talked... and talked some more.

It was announced that Batista would fight the Miz and Cena would fight Jericho in a time limit match. The one who pinned their opponent in the fastest time got to pick the stipulation of the championship match at the next PPV.

After what seemed like an eternity, the Miz came out to have his match with Batista, but instead of the Miz he decided to put in "rookie" Brian Danielson. Then Batista talked about more. Batista's boring enough as it is, without having to put up with 15 minutes of him talking shit (no kidding, and this is without adverts). I think Danielson is a great wrestler and although he jobbed for Batista he put on a decent match which was ruined to some extent by bad announcing, talking about him as he'd only been wrestling a few months. Batista then did a whole bunch of Batista Bombs on Danielson for some reason. 25 minutes in, 5 minutes of match time.

 

There was a backstage slot with Edge talking about how the WWE won't show any of his old promos or matches because he's Rated R and Raw is rated PG. He returned later in the night with the Cutting Edge which he promised would be controversial and rated R... it was neither.

Next we had a match between John Morrison and Ted Diabose coming in off the back of Diabose offering R Truth a job as the new Virgil. The match was a predictable set-up for Morrison as a face. The match ended within about a minute with Dibiose being counted out. Morrison took the mic and invited Dibiose back to the ring explaining that he didn't want his Raw debut to end like that and said that if he lost he would be the new Virgil. I think Dibiase should have walked back to the locker room at this point, making Morrison look like a prick. But as Morrison is blatently being pushed as the next Shawn Michaels, Dibiase gets back in the ring. The match was fantastic, easily on the level of a Kurt Angle main event; a match full of drama with both athletes pushing their bodies to the limit. The match ended with Morrison tapping out to a Million Dollar Dream and Morrison conceded defeat and agreed to become the new Virgil... oh wait, that didn't happen. Morrison predictably won in a mediocre 4 minute match. 40 minutes in, total 10 minutes of match time.

Next up we have Cena versus Jericho. Jericho wouldn't do the same thing as the Miz and bring his rookie Wade Bennett out for the match instead would he? Oh, he would... for fuck's sake. Again, after some dull mic work, Wade jobs for Cena with a tap-out in 4 minutes. 50 minutes in, total 14 minutes of match time. The Sheamus comes in a hits Cena; God this guys really starting to piss me off fella.

Then there was a match between Jack Rider and Mark Henry, does anyone really care about this one. Bad match with two awful wrestlers. 3 minutes wasted. 1 hours 3 minutes in, 17 minutes of match time.

Cut to a promo with the Miz and Jericho becoming a tag team and sitting on a tag match between the Hart Dynasty and that Russian jobber and William Regal. In an upset... there was no upset, Hart Dynasty won in under 4 minutes. With the Miz and Jericho on the announce table for the this, I was suprised at the end of the match when they confirmed their intention to form a tag team, and the beat on the Hart Dynasty. 1 hour 13 minutes in, 21 minutes of match time.



I figured that with the Miz and Jericho teaming up they should pick a name which is a combination of both of their names. I think Jiz is the only name that works.

So the finale of the night, the rated R, controversial talk show with Edge. It was a tame cheap pop mic spot with the guest host (can't remember his name, don't care) and then a bit with Randy Orton. Edge suggested reforming Rated RKO. Orton just stood there. Edge started calling Orton naughty names (but not that naughty). Orton just stood there, Edge went for a spear and Orton did an RKO. Randy Orton? Randy Boreton, more like. This was another dull 15 minute segment which didn't really go anywhere.

WWE Raw: 21 minutes of match time. This is wrestling?